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Not, I must clarify, the only or even best 20 reasons, but simply 20 of all the many, many reasons. There’s been some talk by both friends and strangers that 2009 hasn’t been a year to shout YES! GAMES! in quite the way the last couple have been. I beg to differ. It’s been an extraordinary year, though granted it’s often been necessary to look further than the best-sellers chart. We’re only just entering blockbuster silly season, and already we’ve seen and done countless amazing things in 2009. By which I don’t mean simply “amazing games”, but instead “amazing moments in games.” Here are just a few of them…

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Spelunking has been the big new thing for me in PC gaming this year, and even amongst the various debacles since, TF2 has added all the new Spy and Sniper tricks, and broadened the Engineer a bit, the Sniper/Spy release revitalised the game for me all over again.

Dragging my wounded squadmates to safety, desperately staving off a veritable horde of Insurgents with my 3 remaining unscathed Riflemen while desperately waiting for a Chopper extraction in ARMA II. One of the most cinematic, heart-pounding moments in games without a SINGLE script.

1. Team Fortress 2. Yes, I’ve owned it since late 2007, but I only got into it this year after becoming bored with L4D. And god does it make me laugh and have fun constantly.

2. Fallen Earth Beta – god knows I’m never likley to buy the damn game, not for a couple of years at least. But the beta was a fascinating and often amusing experience, with frequent changes to the gameworld and the community.

3. Synergy V14. HL2 coop on a variety of custom maps as well as support for HL2, both episodes, Minerva, Rock24, Riot Act and Toronto conflict, now with fully functioning autosaves.

4. Meet the Spy. Valve really hit something right there.

5. Getting a personal namecheck in a video from Dejoban.

6. Getting Mass Effect for £5 when Zavvi was shutting down.

7. Managing a rapid retreat in the structure-only The Space Game.

8. Borderlands managing to excite me from the potential alone

9. Having some of my friends play Deus Ex for the first time and hearing their excitement as they go along over ventrilo.

Synergy is awesome, but do check out Obsidian Conflict as well… superb collection of maps (30 right off the bat) and another 30 with the “map pack” on the forums. It has a lobby map that has doors to all the rest of the maps. There is a huge variety of maps as well, puzzle, combat, linear, “funmaps”, harvest maps, etc etc. If you enjoy Synergy, def check out Obsidan Conflict as well: link to obsidianconflict.net

I’m familiar with OC – and while it’s technically superior to Synergy in quite a few ways and hes better community mapping, I dislike it for not actually being HL2 coop, but some horribly warped version of HL2, in coop. Also, last time I played it didn’t do auotsave or proper map changes, which I think are very neat features on Syn’s part.

Definately Zeno Clash, one of the highlights of my year in games, also Spelunky getting more complete (and reaching the fabled secrety secrets…), anything TF2 related has been fun for me to boot.
Also I recall early on in the year that the complete Penumbra collection was released, it’s so nice to have them all on a physical copy, at least unless my mind is playing tricks and it was not released in feb like I remember.
Mount & Blade Warbands beta has been a riot too, far too fun when you perfect throwing stuff in peoples faces.

Most of my other highlights are actually from earlier years, I’ve just liked to revisit them.

“Knight! That’s the last time you destroy my bridge! Okay? Very funny, like, the first time! Now stop!”
“…Okay.”
“Good. Now if I can just buiOHSHITNOYOUBLOODYIDIOT”

Playing the Knight in Trine was a good laff. You couldn’t do very much, and what you could do you couldnt do very well. But you could destroy an entire carefully constructed mage bridge with a single hammer blow, killing your more gifted compatriots in an act of brutal, suicidal, pointless betrayal. Over and over again.

Aye, this has certainly been a great year outside of the mainstream. PvZ aside, mine has to be sliding gently into that odd muscle-memory, reflex non-conciousness of playing Quake III. Feels odd after playing TF2 for so long.

Also, Batman’s cape. That’s what a multimillion dollar project can do when they hire a single guy for 18 months just to work on the sounds and movement of a cape…

The announcement that a Planetside 2 might actually happen and that they’ve fielded opinions from all the players they can get a hold of. I’m sure there are other things, but this for me is probably the most significant.

1. The end of WoW: Stopped playing sometime late last year, but I only cancelled my subscription this February. Boredom finally ended my love affair with the game that had lasted years. However, unlike many who (seemingly) hate the game after quitting, I still think it is a brilliant game and provided possibly the most unique gaming experience of my life. The plus side of quitting the game is that I now have so much time to play other games.

2. Indie games: So many good ones that came out this year, and (for me) lots of catching up with older ones as well. Killing Floor, Trine, Aquaria, Zeno Clash, Blueberry Garden, Penumbra, Garry’s Mod, Defense Grid , World of Goo and Braid come to mind, plus more I must have played. These games are a labor of love for the developers and often remind me why gaming is my passion. Even now, amongst the giants like L4D2 and Modern Warfare 2, I am putting Machinarium on my list of most anticipated games releasing soon.

3. Digital distribution: I’m aware it was around before 2009 as well, but I think that digital distribution really took off this year. Steam, Impulse, Gamersgate and a bunch of other sites became popular. A godsend for people who live in countries like mine where not all games actually release, and where a purchase isn’t simply a matter of ordering off some shop like Amazon.

4. The weekend deal: Again, not a new concept but it really caught gamers’ attention this year. All the major digital distribution platforms recognized this and as a result, us gamers have been spoilt for choice with great sales which are available pretty much every day of the week now. I’m sure I’m not the only one who has built up a collection (and backlog) of games bought on such sales. And they are just great… sometimes we are willing to take a gamble on a game that might not be worth the regular asking price. Other times you might discover a gem of a game on a sale. And in any case, it rarely feels like money wasted. My steam games list grew from probably 20 at the start of the year to almost 100 now.

5. TF2: Just have to mention this one, it’s the only game I keep coming back to even 2 years after release. I might not have agreed with all of Valve’s decisions for the game, but it’s clear to me that they genuinely care about the gamer’s experience and they are just funny people. It’s so easy to want to like them given all the things that make up the TF2 experience, which is not just the game, but includes all the hilarity in the blog at the time of the updates, the meet the character videos and what not.

6. Monkey Island: I’ll wrap up my list with this. I would never have imagined that Monkey Island would be brought back to life this year, and I was over the moon when I read about it. My favorite adventure games of all time (and I’ve been playing games for 20 years), brought back with the episodes and the special edition. I can tell you that I have a stupid smile on my face almost every moment I am playing Monkey Island. What more can a gamer ask for?

Completely agree. For the most part(on the servers I play on) even when getting thrashed everyone has a great laugh, 6 months or so back, we were getting absolutely steamrolled on badwater and the whole blu team broke into an impromptu “Everybody hurts” sing-a-long over voice chat. That match is definately one of my gaming highlights of the year.

Blood Bowl has provided many standout moments, like my Ogre killing himself when he tried to block a Goblin, and a low-Agility Black Orc making a spectacularly unlikely catch-and-blitz-and-dodge-and-GFI to score the winning touchdown on the last turn of the match. The dice were with me that day.

Campaign DoW2 in co-op is how it really should be played. Suddenly pulling off complicated maneuvers becomes about communication rather than frantic mouse-clicking. It makes you feel like a real commander because you’re you’re giving and recieving orders, and without any of that dodgy EndWar speech recognition nonsense. You find yourself sounding like a character from a scifi action movie.
“I need support to the West! The Commander is pinned down and the Tactical squad is taking fire!”
“Get the Tacticals to cover, sniper support is moving up. Assault drop in three… two… one…”

I have to admit, gaming-wise I didn’t enjoy 2009 as much as some other years.

Mostly this is the fault of TF2, which I have completely and utterly burnt out on but which I still keep coming back to every so often only to not enjoy it again. The two games I really really liked over the last year would have to be DoW II and Batman, with Prototype coming in at third.

Also I never did play spelunky but I guess I’ll go play it now since you all are gushing about it so much

7.) The internet flies Gabe to Australia to check out some random dude’s L4D campaign.

…

Honestly, though… not the most amazing year for PC gaming. Especially in the mainstream. Not a single “big release” I could get excited about. The indie scene, however, is growing into something truly amazing.

{A few of last year’s titles but I only received a new rig in the middle of this year.}

1. GTA IV, yes it could’ve provided anti-aliasing with Dx10 support or ran much better but official patches and the customer concern of ATi have let me play the game with high-resolution textures, mouse-aiming and a view-distance and image quality have contributed to a wonderful experience that is incomparable to the console version. I contend that it’s one of the finest games to play high and the sheer achievement of the animation, art design, atmosphere, gun-play, car-physics and overall design make me load it up to just drive around listening to Jazz to absorb the incredible ambience of merely cruising around the neon and asphalt jungle.

2. Fallout 3. Walking through destroyed suburbs whilst the sunset bleeds through the metal skeletons of buildings set to Billie Holiday is a revelation.

3. Valve’s continuing brilliance and community love in everything they do, TF2 is consistently wonderful and only getting better.

4. Being genuinely surprised and impressed by the quality of Arkham Asylum.

This is pretty slim pickings on the AAA front. It’s been a good year for indy gaming (PvZ, Defense Grid– some really nice stuff) but they’re appetizers, not a meal.

I like RPGs and strategy games foremost. We’ve had a couple of MMOs, which are really their own beast but not anything quite as heavily hyped as WAR/AoC/WoLK in 2008. So far, no outstanding single player RPG to speak of(as of the end of September– year isn’t over yet). In strategy we’ve had nothing but DOTA-alikes (DOW2, Demigod, etc– we really need a genre-name for this). Even in shooters, we’re still hyperventillating over continued support for the hit breakout game of 2007 (TF2)– which was, for my money, not even the best game that came in its box.

More and more our reasons for glee are chances to (sometimes) literally relive the glories of the past (Wow, old Lucas Arts games on Steam? Really? AND I can play old sierra games in a browser?!) and more and more top titles I’d like to play are simply giving the PC a pass (Brutal Legend, I’m looking at you).

Spelunky, playing Dear Esther, Planescape Torment in Widescreen, AAaAAaAaaaAAaaaaAAAaaA!, everything Edmund Mcmillen does (Including Spewer and Time Fcuk), Borderlands looks exciting, driving around the massive landscapes of FUEL in a muscle car, and information about Natural Selection 2 being released.

Pouncing 3 different survivors in the same game for 25 pounce damage each, causing each to rage quit.

Watching my g/f play Plants vs Zombies, not for the zombies as much as for the Zen Garden. Oh, and her Tree of Wisdom is over 200 feet tall… O.o That’s a lot of cash spent on fertilizer, but she loves that thing, hah!

Discovering an awesome HL2 Coop mod called Obsidian Conflict: link to obsidianconflict.net with loads of maps to play coop. The puzzle maps are my favorite, very clever stuff.

Playing Nazi Zombies from CoD: World at War with a group of 3 other friends. There are loads of custom maps available too, do check those out.

Am I the only one who thought that DoW:II was a bit crap? Now I love the warhammer universe both 40k and fantasy, but CoH was SUCH a better RTS. DoW does’nt know whether it wants to be a strategy or a roleplaying game and it fails at both.

I didn’t think it was crap, I just think it’s not an RTS in the same way DoW or CoH were (And speaking of CoH– Tales of Valor: disappointment of the year?). It’s got this Action-RTS thing going on, and it’s better compared to DotA or Demigod.

1) Getting a new laptop and finally being able to play the Half Life episodes, Dreamfall, Spore and new games in general.

2) Indy gamin awesomeness. Whether Time Gentlemen Please, Spelunky, Plants Vs Zombies, Bookworm Adventures 2, Chains or any other of the myriad titles. Machinarium will be on this list when it comes out.

3) The return of Monkey Island and Lucas Arts getting a new president who seems to actually care about the kind of games that made them liked in the first place.

4) Steam Weeken deals – even if they have ended up in an unplayed virtual pile.

1. That one puzzle in Braid.
2. Playing the stealth bit of the Arkham Asylum demo, many many times over.
3. Finishing the Phoenix Wright saga. (Not a PC game. But: you can play it on a PC.)
4. Relapsing back to my Oni habit.
5. Pushing [spoilerz] under a bus in Mass Effect.
6. Uninstalling The Witcher.
7. Getting a fancy new computer so I could actually play modern-gen games.
8. Going back to the old ones cause they’re better anyway.

1. Realisation that this hobby can be affordable if I just realign my tastes more in tune with the plethora of Indy offerings.
2. Hence no longer reading this blog and feeling like a guilty pirate / sad panda. “Arr Matey I’m a skurvy panda.”
3. 2009 has seen the return of my favourite genre: The Adventure. Not only is my old pal back to fight again but recent entries in the field have kicked the absolute snot out of all the FPSes, TPSes and RTSes I’ve been numbly traipsing through the last 10 years. Take that TLAs!
4. Related to three, I have actually laughed out loud several times this year thanks to games. Time Gentlemen being the stand-out offender. Several examples have shown that writing in games generally seems to be on the up and up and up.
5. Selling my Xbox 360 and no longer giving a fuck about Activision, Eidos, EA, TakeTwo, Sony, Microsoft or any of the other big money marketing cum dumpster anti-idea-factories.

And so it is, 2009 has been the year I felt like a gamer and started to care about this hobby once again.

1.) Playing Mirrors Edge for the first time reinvigorated my belief that a.) even EA can take some risks, and B.) developers still have a lot to explore. Underrated in my opinion, I really hope there’s a sequel.
2.) L4D versus becoming mainstay, countless hours put into this one.
3.) Braid! Realising that genius and love can create a brilliant game without needing a multi million budget.
4.) World of goo (of course)
5.) My girlfriend discovering braid 
6.) Playing the old-world series for the first time thanks to steam, brilliant platformer.

1. Discovering I can play all the “meh” console games on my “meh” PC + X360 pad.
2. Zeno Clash. All of it.
3. Defense Grid: is that guy Mr. Belvedere?
4. Rediscovering RPS
5. Getting back into XCom. And promptly losing a week.
6. Playing the original STALKER
7. Having my old gaming PC crap itself and discovering some of the neat Mac games.
8. Finally buying Hearts of Iron II and World of Goo (see #7)
9. Rediscovering the joy of wee-ing on myself in Sims 3
10. The Nameless Mod. Seriously. Go play it.
11. Batman: Arkham Asylum.
12. L4D getting free DLC
13. TF2 addons. Friggin spies.
14. Finally getting around to Far Cry 2, and discovering its like a non-horror STALKER but in Africa.
15. Realizing that 15 is 20 in base-5, and that I’m done.

1. Installing Stalker Complete 2009 and playing it all over AGAIN and loving every moment of it (nights are more fantastic than ever).
2. Buying and playing the crap out of the Fallout 3, since it has totally acceptable price of box version in Poland now.
3. Like above, but with Mass Effect, even if it comes a bit average compared to…
4….The Witcher, which has great price as well (and great edition), which also makes Mass Effect look like a dumb, shallow TPP shooter with some pretty talking heads and cheesy clichey s-f plot.
5. Defense Grid is fantastic.
6. Braid is smart, tough as hell and very satisfying.
7. Trine is smart, beautiful and just all around great.
8. Yes, indeed punching all these Dali-esque things in Zeno Clash is very relaxing. Hooray for devs making sequel.
9. Finally getting Portal and finishing it without a look into the walkthroughs – I’m pretty proud of myself.
10. Dawn of War 2 was sort of fun.
11. Assorted flash games found on RPS – thanks guys, these [for heaven’s sakes what’s wrong with you to use that word like that? -RPS] tons of my free time which could be wasted anyway in lots of less entertaining ways.
12. I almost forgot – Edge games scam and their hilariously fabricated evidence. I like this sort of thing.
13. R&D mod for HL2:EP2 was cool as well.

Biggest dissapointment: still no sight of new Frictional Games production. Boo. Good to see Machinarium will be out soon, though.